The Meaning Of The Word “Is”

“A cardinal rule of the Obama administration was that no White House official ever interfered with any independent investigation led by the Department of Justice,” said Kevin Lewis. “As part of that practice, neither President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any U.S. citizen. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false.”

No. Sorry, that’s not going to cut it. I may have been born at night, but I wasn’t born last night. I know how this works. When Guido put a hit on Lucky Louie, The Don didn’t actually order that, he just mentioned that he really needs this problem to go away. There’s never an outright order, hasn’t been since some guy innocently wondered “Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?”

If Obama were innocent, that’s not the way to deny the accusation. When someone asks: “Did Obama order a wiretap on Trump?” you say “No.” Unless he did it. Then you have to weasel around the question. But not like that. Like this:

Trump has exactly as much evidence that Obama “wire tapped” him as he does that Obama was born in Kenya. History teaches us a lot of things. One of them is to know what one is talking about.

Here’s the root of Trump’s problems — he lies. All the time. He lie about big things, little things, everything. I and much of the world believes nothing that comes out of his mouth, or his administration’s mouth. It will be his downfall.

You don’t want to go there, Emery. There is more credible evidence that Obama was born in Kenya than there is for his birth in Hawaii.

Obama wrote a book claiming to have been born in Kenya. He left that book in circulation for years, unchanged, until his eligibility for President became an issue. The claim he made in his book is a “statement of personal or family history” which is admissible under Rule 804(b)(4) of the Minnesota Rules of Evidence.

Contrary evidence might be a certified copy of a birth certificate issued by custodian of records for the State of Hawaii, bearing a stamp saying something like “I have compared this copy to the original on file in my office and I certify this is a true and correct copy of the original.” There isn’t one.

The White House released an electronic image of a birth certificate but also admitted they altered the image. That evidence would be inadmissible in court.

You’re left with one piece of evidence that is relevant, material, competent and admissible – the statement in his book. The birthers win.

There is more evidence that Trump was wiretapped than there is that the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians.
Yet, for some reason, the MSM never begins its reports on the Trump-Russia accusations by stating that there is no evidence that the Trump campaign worked with the Russians to hack the election.
Trump’s statements tend to be negotiating positions, not statements of fact. “You say I lost the popular vote by 2 million? Well, I say 4 million of Hillary’s votes were illegal. Watcha say to that?”

I see our precious snowflake was up early today. In other news – according to Russian ambassador, sHrillary campaign staff visited his offices on more than one occasion. My, my, my… If the Russian collusion story was a lie, what can be said of the doublespeak non-answer that wiretapping did not happen? Don’t look now, but the snowflake is melting!

If there was no surveillance of the Trump campaign, please explain to me how functionaries leaked surveillance data to the Washington Post to attack Trump hires. The best defense Obama can come up with is a technicality, really–“Oh, it wasn’t specifically an electronic device connected to the telephone lines within Trump Tower” or something like that.

Why shouldn’t Trump be expected to produce proof of his claim or retract it? That sounds like an entirely reasonable request.

In the end, I suspect we will be waiting as long for Trump to release evidence that Obama wiretapped him as we have been waiting for the evidence Trump was going to produce proving Obama wasn’t born in the U.S.

Washington (AFP) – A senior Republican lawmaker on Sunday challenged President Donald Trump to prove his claim that his phone was tapped by predecessor Barack Obama during last year’s campaign — or else retract the unsubstantiated allegation.

Emery, the claim by some in the Trump camp is that the JD got a FISA warrant to eavesdrop on Russians and Trump associates (but not Trump or his campaign staff), Trump and campaign staff communications were inadvertently captured, and portions of these communications were illegally leaked by people in the intelligence community.
Do you find that scenario beyond belief? Do you think that Trump’s tweets could not refer to this scenario?

Woolly: Wich is it? Either Obama wired tapped his phones because Trump is/was being investigated or there was never a wire tap because he’s never been the subject of an investigation. Even in the alternate reality of the WH, those two things can’t coexist.

Emery on March 13, 2017 at 11:26 am said:
The elephant in the room here is that Trump is willing to lie and then lie about lying and Republicans (with the exception of John McCain) are unwilling to call him on it.
There were over thirty occasions when Obama said that Obamacare would let you keep your health plan and your doctor. This was a lie. Where was your outrage then? The media never questioned Obama’s lie, even though it was clear that it was a lie when he spoke the words — Obama had no idea what was in the ACA. It was written by Pelosi, Reid, their aides, and health insurance company lobbyists.

Emery on March 13, 2017 at 11:37 am said:
Woolly: Wich is it? Either Obama wired tapped his phones because Trump is/was being investigated or there was never a wire tap because he’s never been the subject of an investigation. Even in the alternate reality of the WH, those two things can’t coexist.
You don’t have to be the subject of an investigation to have your phone tapped, Emery. The person who is calling you might be the subject of the investigation. Or you might use the phone or the computer of a person who is being investigated.
All of these scenarios have been discussed at length by knowledgeable people on the Right (by Andy McCarthy, for example). I’m surprised at your ignorance on the topic, and at your anger at a presidential tweet.

These calls for Trump to provide evidence of any tapping are interesting. Maybe he’s holding his cards until others make sworn statements before congress, and if any are perjurious he could then expose them. He can order ALL evidence be given to him by all agencies. I have no doubt that he already has the facts, and heads will roll. He’s just letting congress set and tighten the noose. Will Clapper, Brennan, and others end up taking the 5th before Congress?

I and much of the world believes nothing that comes out of his mouth, or his administration’s mouth. It will be his downfall.
Now you know how I felt for the last 8 years Emery. The only reason it wasn’t his downfall is because the MSM had covered his ass from day 1.

Woolly: You seem more agitated that someone is challenging your narrative. Personally, I am both entertained and amused by Trump’s unforced errors.
Trump says, “Obama wire-tapped me.” When it’s pointed out that he has zero evidence, he and his acolytes say, “We need an investigation to find the missing evidence.”

Missing Evidence. ‘We don’t gotta show you no stinking evidence.’

I think it’s time for an independent prosecutor to be appointed for a full investigation. Trump’s accusations, if false, are highly toxic to an open democracy. Trump’s accusations, if true, demand that we know if Trump is being investigated or if Obama broke the law. In any case, these allegations should not be allowed to stand unanswered. I think we all know where this is headed: Trump’s a compulsive liar and should be called out on it.

Woolly: You seem more agitated that someone is challenging your narrative.

Let me see… eTASS makes an accusation in the first post, for which JD takes him behind the shed and thoroughly whips him. eTASS ignores the beatdown and just keeps moving the goalposts. You could blame the time change for the idiocy that is eTASS, but alas he had proven time and time again he is nothing but a hypocritical turd thrower. Lucky for him, he is so full of shit that there is no shortage of turds.

I don’t have a narrative.
I’m interested in why Trump tweeted the accusation.
I assume, of course, that Trump is clever enough to beat a dozen or so competitors to the GOP nomination, and clever enough to win election to the highest office in the land.
Many of Trump’s critics still act as though he is so dim-witted and undisciplined that he couldn’t get elected dog catcher. I will not make that mistake.

Wiretapped Data Used in Inquiry of Trump Aides.
By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT, MATTHEW ROSENBERG, ADAM GOLDMAN and MATT APUZZOJAN. 19, 2017
After Trump tweeted his wiretapping accusation the Times changed the headline to “Intercepted Russian Communications Part of Inquiry Into Trump Associates”
Gotta love the NY Times. It’s kind of like negative information, you are dumber for reading it.

What I have read — unconfirmed, of course — is that the JD was investigating Alfa Bank, a Russian bank suspected of money laundering. As part of the investigation they tapped one or more phone and/or computer at Trump businesses (Alfa Bank is big, Trump’s organization does business in Russia).
Now Trump was not the subject of the investigation. This was a FISA warrant on foreign communications. FISA is not supposed to be for American communications. The bar is high to keep the US government from spying on Americans.
Anyway, the story is that this wiretap info is the source of the leaks.

Trump uses twitter to guide narratives. He may have made his wiretapping tweets to remind people that the only illegal act uncovered so far was the leak itself, and that he had the power to put the leakers in jail if he could ID them.

There are liberal partisans who say Trumpshould be investigated for his Russian ties. That he’s probably laundering money for the Russians through his businesses, e.g. buying that Florida mansion for 40 mill and selling it one year later to a Russian for 100 mill. That’s one of the reasons he won’t release his taxes. They would like to subpoena them and find out who owes what to whom.

I would say that US. intelligence services have determined that Russia violated US national sovereignty, invaded US data reserves, stole data, and released it as part of its efforts to tip US election in a way of its choosing: toward Mr. Trump. Subsequently, members of Mr. Trump’s team, it has been revealed, had extensive contacts with Russia during the election. Several people Mr. Trump has appointed have been publicly shamed as they have been caught lying about their relationship to Russia or conversations they have had in the past. Given these facts, it is in the best interests of American citizens to investigate Mr. Trump himself.

I would say that US. intelligence services have determined that Russia violated US national sovereignty, invaded US data reserves, stole data, and released it as part of its efforts to tip US election in a way of its choosing: toward Mr. Trump.
Emery, I can’t believe you would write this WITH NO EVIDENCE to back up your claims.
Right up until Nov. 9 you though Hillary was headed for a landslide. Your theory is ex post facto reasoning, and therefore highly suspicious. It is a “just so” story.

Emery, it’s worth noting that the Russians may have used Trump, but they are pretty certain to have hacked White House servers a couple of years prior to that with no response whatsoever from Obama that anyone could tell. So it’s OK to hack the U.S. government as long as it’s “your team” getting hacked or something? This also casts in doubt the notion that the Russians would prefer Trump in office–it isn’t Trump, after all, that did all he could to shut down petroleum and allowed the Russians free rein in White House computers. One would ordinarily assume they would favor Hilliary simply because she vowed to continue Obama policies that served them so well for eight years.

Here’s what we know:
1) Trump supporters love spectacle and Trump delivers. Truth, reality…? These aren’t even considerations. So no Trump supporter is going to care a whit about whether or not Trump’s bluster is true; they just love “their guy” doing his usual circus clown act.
2) No Republican is going to investigate Trump’s accusations because the result would be to show that he’s a halfwit with the emotional capacity of a spoiled four-year-old. We already know that, so what’s the point?

Trump’s blatant lies have corroded everyone to the point where no one cares any more. In fact, the more outrageous the lie the more quickly people accept it, forget it, and move on to the next inflammatory tweet. This is President-As-Theater.

I would say that US. intelligence services have determined that Russia violated US national sovereignty, invaded US data reserves, stole data, and released it as part of its efforts to tip US election in a way of its choosing: toward Mr. Trump.

Provide proof, a la JD at 9:14. Everything else you spew is just that – regurgitated, chewed up and spit out talking points and yes, LIES. You have nothing, so you are projecting, according to one of the myriad of Berg’s immutable laws.

When voters (some Hillary, some GOP) pointed out that Obama’s real estate with Tony Rezko could be money laundering, they relied on public records — and the accusation of ‘money laundering’ was never repeated in the MSM (except, perhaps, the Chicago Tribune, which actually looked with a jaundiced eye at the 2008 candidacy of native pol Barack H. Obama). The IRS actually looks for evidence of money laundering in returns. I expect that New York Real estate magnates probably receive more scrutiny from the IRS than Mammuthus Primigenius.
Yet, before the election, no democrat ever proposed that Trump was money laundering for the Russians. If Trump was under investigation by the IRS, it would have leaked. Look at Trump’s legal difficulties that were publicized by the Dems, for goodness sake. No one was pulling their punches.
The reason Democrats (and the media, but I repeat myself) demanded a look at Trump’s tax returns before the election was because they wanted to go on a fishing expedition. This is why they want to look at them now.

When Obama was running the show, he’d do some nasty bit, we’d raise hell about it and he’d light up the White House with the gayz flag to let us know he gave two shits what we thought, and go golfing.

It’s the right way to handle things in 21st century America.

Trump won; we won. He should do whatever the hell he wants to do, and the reprobates can go fuck themselves.

And side deals? Oh hell yeah.

I hope he’s stacking fat stacks of cash with the Russkies. No President left office without stacks since Truman. Obama showed up with his shabby wife and dreams of exclusive golf club membership…which he got.

Trump came to the job with stacks…he’s gonna need a forklift to haul his wallet and a C130 to haul the forklift.

The FSB is the successor to the KGB. Like the KGB, it is not known for subtlety.
It does bribery, blackmail, torture, targeted assassination.
The Manchurian Candidate was fiction. In the real world, the Soviet/Russian intelligence service is as corrupt and ham-handed as our own. The most important mission the KGB ever had was the pro-soviet coup of August 1991. They f*cked that up.